1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a hard disk drive (HDD), and more particularly, to an actuator of an HDD supporting a head slider to write data on a disk or read data written to the disk, and a method of fabricating the actuator.
2. Description of the Related Art
Hard disk drives (HDDs), which are auxiliary memory devices for computers or the like, read data stored in a disk or write new data to the disk using a head slider. During operation of the HDDs, the head slider is kept floating at a predetermined flying height over the disk and a magnetic head mounted on the head slider reads data stored in the disk or writes new data to the disk. An actuator having a front end to which the head slider is attached moves the head slider to a predetermined position on the disk.
FIG. 1 is an exploded perspective view of a conventional actuator 10.
Referring to FIG. 1, the conventional actuator 10 includes first and second arm members 11 and 21 formed by a pressing process, a voice coil member 33 interposed between the pair of arm members 11 and 21, an arm body 30 passing through the first and second arm members 11 and 21 and the voice coil member 33, and a nut 38 engaging with an end portion of the arm body 30 with a washer 36 therebetween to fasten the pair of arm members 11 and 21 and the voice coil member 33. Suspensions 13 and 23 are respectively coupled to front end portions of the first and second arm members 11 and 21 by a swaging process. Head sliders 15 and 25 are attached to the suspensions 13 and 23, respectively.
In the meantime, spacers 17 and 27 are respectively interposed between the first arm member 11 and the voice coil member 33 and between the second arm member 21 and the voice coil member 33 to maintain a proper interval between the pair of arm members 11 and 21.
Since the actuator 10 having this structure requires the spacers 17 and 27 to maintain the interval between the pair of arm members 11 and 21, the number of components is large, thereby increasing production costs. Furthermore, since the spacers 17 and 27 should be sequentially fitted around the arm body 30, assembly time increases and productivity decreases.